Disk drives are information storage devices that use magnetic media to store data. Referring to FIG. 1, a typical disk drive in prior art comprises a drive arm 5, a head gimbal assembly (HGA) 4 with a slider 3 being coupled to the drive arm 5 (the drive arm and the HGA with the slider also known as head stack assembly (HSA)), a magnetic disk 1 mounted on a spindle motor 2 which causes the magnetic disk 1 to spin, and a disk drive base plate 13 to enclose the above-mentioned components. The slider 3 flies over the surface of the magnetic disk 1 at a high velocity and is positioned radially by a voice coil 7 embedded (e.g. by epoxy potting or overmolding) in a fantail spacer 8 to read data from or write data to concentric data tracks on the magnetic disk 1. Generally, a voice coil motor (VCM) 10 is used to drive the voice coil 7.
Referring to FIGS. 2(a) and 3, a traditional head stack assembly (HSA) comprises an independent fantail spacer 8 which is interposed between two pieces of the drive arms 5 and combines with the drive arms 5 together with a securing means. The securing means is consisted of a pivot member 6, a washer 25′ and a nut 26′. In the prior art, the HGA 4 is coupled to the drive arm 5 by laser welding or swaging the suspension of the HGA 4 with the drive arm 5. The drive arms 5 each have a suspension flexure cable 20 running from the sliders 3 to a plurality of bonding pads 19. The suspension flexure cable 20 is secured to the suspension of the HGA 4 by laser welding or adhesive.
In typical disk drives, referring to FIGS. 2(a) and 2(b), electrical control signals are communicated to the voice coil 7 by a flexible printed circuit assembly (FPCA) 9. The bonding pads 19 of the suspension flexure cable 20 are electrically connected with the FPCA 9 by using connection balls 15 (e.g., by soldering or ultrasonic bonding) to bond the bonding pads 19 to a plurality of connecting pads 16 of the FPCA 9. Thus, the FPCA 9 may communicate read/write data to the slider(s) 3. In addition, referring to FIG. 1, a printed circuit board (PCB) 11 mounted on a bracket 12 is provided to control the position of the drive arm(s) 5 with the slider(s) 3.
With reference to FIG. 2(a), the FPCA 9 is aligned with the fantail spacer 8 at an end thereof by an alignment pin 17 protruding from the fantail spacer 8. After positioning, the FPCA 9 will be electrically coupled to the HGA 4.
However, because the traditional HSA use the independent fantail spacer 8 to partition the two pieces of the drive arms 5, and manufacturing the fantail spacer 8 takes much time and money, the cost of the HSA becomes higher and the manufacturing process becomes more complicated.
It is therefore desirable to provide a HSA of a disk drive unit and manufacturing method thereof to solve the above-mentioned problems.